****Spoiler Warning****

I am an avid reader.  I love books, and the books that I love have been read numerous times.  (Should I say at least 30 times in my life?)  There are very few books that capture my imagination like the Chronicles of Narnia.  Everytime I read them, I find something new that paints a picture of God's abounding Godness to me.  (Okay, Godness is not a real word, but I couldn't come up with any other.)   In C. S. Lewis' wonderful storytelling, I gain insight into the Real Aslan in such a simple, yet multi-faceted way.  The books stand for themselves.  They don't need to be fleshed out.  They don't need to have more excitement added to them.  Having seen The  Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe in theaters, and on DVD, I do know that the screenwriter(s) and director like to "up the ante" by adding ridiculous scenes that are so unlike C. S. Lewis' stories.  However, I was able to stomach those intrusions because they got so much stuff right.  Not so in Prince Caspian.  I wasn't actually timing it, but it did seem as if there was an entire hour's worth of drivel that had nothing to do with the book that I hold near and dear.  What were they thinking?  Peter was acting so unlike the noble High King Peter from the series.  He was irritable, jealous of his position, churlish, petulant, and downright Edmund-like (from the first movie), that I wanted to slap him, and Andrew Adamson ( the director).  He was making inane military moves that High King Peter would never have made.  Is it so wrong to make a movie that is like the book?  I realize that everything can't be put in a movie that is in a book.  I understand that completely.  My question is why add scenes like that?  What is the purpose?

My second grievance with the movie is the whole love interest thing between Susan and Caspian.  WHAT IS THAT???  Where did that come from?  HELLO????  The kiss at the end was enough to make me ask for my money back, and get a personal apology from the Powers That Be at Walden Media.

To top it off, some of my favorite parts of the book were twisted and completely out of order.  The whole trip to the Bridge of Beruna, and Lucy choosing to follow Aslan whether the others did or not, was a key picture of following Christ whether anyone else does or not.  Why convolute it like they did?  It was so simple, and they could have really made a go of the final battle with all the bells and whistles that they wanted.  I understand why they didn't put Caspian's nurse into the movie, and why Aslan and the girls didn't go through the countryside gaily "freeing" people, and having their little party.  That didn't bother me.  I didn't expect it anyway. 

I was really hoping that they'd get through at least The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, The Silver Chair, and The Final Battle.  (I don't think they will ever do The Magician's Nephew, or The Horse and His Boy.)  However, now I'm not too sure I want them to.  If they continue to chop up the books and throw them out as scraps to a dog, I don't think I'll hang around for The Final Battle, which is actually my favorite of the series.

On a final note, if you haven't read the book, or haven't read it in 10 or 20 years, you'll love the movie.  I urge you, however, to read the book after you have seen the movie.  You won't be disappointed.

Yes, I know, I've been gone for a while.  I have good reasons, really I do.  I feel very rundown, and don't feel I have much to say.  This usually happens to me in the spring.  Things are picking up at work, and  at home, I am trying to finish up our homeschooling year.  Well, really, we homeschool year-round, but the end of this year is approaching, and the beginning of the new year is, as well.  The dilemma of what homeschool curriculum to use next year, and how to pay for it is a major consideration.  The fact that I just went through a year of illness and fatigue weighs me down.  I'm not sure if I will ever get all the energy and stamina that I once had.  Let's not forget about extra projects that I've been working on for work.  Also, the fact that I work full-time AND homeschool the kids at night, should be reason enough for the blog being put to the side for awhile.

I have been working on a project for my husband.  He has a very small home-based business that we have decided to focus on more.  He does Celtic woodworking.  This has always been a hobby of his, but we are hoping to build it into a more profitable undertaking.  Anyway, I'm revamping his website.  While I was working on it, I set up a blog for him.  Go ahead and take a look at Gregg's website and blog, and let me know what you think.  I'm still working on the gallery for his website.  It's not even near completion, but the blog is definitely complete.  I really like the look of it.  You can choose the wallpaper by clicking on one of the thumbnails in the sidebar.

After I finish Gregg's website, I'm going to go ahead and revamp mine.  I can't even remember the last time I updated it.  I have to say that I really enjoyed setting up Gregg's blog.  I am considering setting up a blog for myself on my website.  I'm not sure that I want to do that.  I really enjoy the camaraderie and sense of community here at Homeschool Blogger.  What do you think?

These pictures were taken when we first went into the Creation Museum.  When we left, they put the backgrounds in, and we chose which ones we wanted.  For the first pose, we were supposed to look up and to the right like we were scared.  As you will notice, Gregg waved to the dinosaur instead of acting afraid.  Aneira didn't quite understand the directions. We thought that the caption could say something like "Oh, goody, he's going to eat my family, HI!!!).  LOL!  Anyway, for your viewing pleasure, here are the two poses.

Yes, I've been missing in action again.  I'm so sorry.  The last couple of weeks have been wild and crazy.  I had a project to do for work, and two more from other sources.   Not to mention I've been trying to keep up with homeschool.  Then last week I contracted the flu.  The last six months have been very hard on me as far as illness is concerned, and I am extremely sick and tired of being sick and tired.  I've been entirely useless this week, mostly just sitting and sleeping in the recliner watching a myriad of DVDs.

I'm sorry for such a short post, but I did want to let everyone know what's been going on.  Hopefully soon I'll be back up and running.  Have a great weekend!

Here is a montage of our trip.  This is not all of them.  The snow pictures aren't in there.  That will be a different post.  Arianna uploaded the pictures from both cameras and they are out of order.  Sorry about that!  The Creation Museum is first, then the aquarium.

Hello!  I'll bet you thought I had dropped off the face of the earth.  I really haven't.  I've just had a hard time getting better.  I'm just sort of rundown by the time I get home.  Nothing to worry about.  This is how I usually am when I get bronchitis.

Today we are in Kentucky, ready to go to the Creation Museum.  We drove up yesterday in our little Suzuki Firenza wagon, which barely holds the three kids in the backseat.  LOL.  They were a bit cramped.  Gregg and I usually get pretty sore driving that far.  It took about 7 hours, but we had to keep stopping to stretch our legs, use the restrooms.  We stopped to eat twice on the way.  We are staying in a neat hotel.  The hotel room itself is nothing to write home about, although the bathrooms are extremely clean.  Well, the room is clean, too.  The outside looks like an Elizabethan era building.  The lobby is very cool, too.  We didn't really know what it looked like when we chose it.  It must have been a God thing.  Gregg loves middle ages and renaissance history.  I will be sure to take pictures.  It has free wireless internet, and they gave a very good deal on the aquarium tickets.

Tomorrow we will be going to the Newport Aquarium.  We figured that since we were here anyway, we might as well go see it, too.  We love aquariums.  This will be a good rounding out of our Oceanography study.

You may ask why we are here to begin with.  Aric will be turning 18 on March 17th (yep, that's St. Patrick's Day).  We couldn't figure out what would be a good birthday present.  Then we thought of this!  He was ecstatic about it.  He's kind of lost his enthusiasm with the trip after yesterday's trip, and then sleeping on the floor.  (He sleeps on the floor anyway at home.  Gregg built him a closet bed at no cheap cost not too long ago, but he insists on sleeping on the floor most of the time.  Not sure why.)  He says it's because it's a strange place, which could very well be.  All I know is that I wouldn't feel great today after sleeping on the floor.  It was tough enough sleeping on a double sized bed when we are used to a king size.  I'm so sore I can barely stand it.  That's alright.  The museum will make up for it!

Oh, and it's SNOWING!!!!  The housecleaning lady told me that they were so sick of snow.  It's still pretty cool to me.  I hope that we will be able to drive around in it.

Well, I'd better get ready before Gregg gets up.  Only one bathroom, you know.  Although there is a sink outside of the bathroom.  The kids are all ready.  Arianna is reading her book; Aric is playing on his gameboy, and Aneira is straightening up  everything.  She even unpacked everyone's bags yesterday.  She's my neat freak.  I don't mind.  :)

Well, the wonderful flu bug developed into bronchitis, and I'm completely worn out.  I did good to homeschool.  In all, I missed five days of work.  I went back a couple of days in between, when I really should have rested at home.  However, there were many tasks that needed to be completed by a certain time, so I had to go.  That doesn't make for a very rested sick person.  Add to that the fact that I can't sleep lying down flat when I have bronchitis, and you can see my dilemma.  Thinking of things to write when I feel that way is very difficult for me, so I usually do something that requires less brain power when I'm done homeschooling.  I'm feeling better now that the my head is clearer, but the tight chest is a bit of a downer.  I'm just glad that it is the weekend.

I still need to:

1. Complete the tag littlebrowngirl tagged me with.
2. Put my award up from mamasmurf and nikowa.
   
3. Decide which ten blogs to award the Excellent Blogger Award.  Or should that be 20 since I was awarded twice?
   
4. Catch up on everybody else's blogs.
5. Change my template to pansies.
6. Read ariannajoy's and ariclegomaniac's  entries and post them.  (They don't post until I have approved them.)
7. Post another resource or two, or three, or more.  I'm very behind.

I promise I will get some of them done tomorrow.  The pansies will have to wait.  What do you think, should I change my template to pansies, or should I start another blog with pansies?

• Link to the person who tagged you
• Post the rules on your blog
• Share six non-important things/habits/quirks about yourself
• Tag six random people at the end of your post by linking to their blogs
• Let each random person know they've been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

1. I collect things that have pansies on them (my dishes, my pots and pans, pictures, paintings, whatever).
2. I enjoy watching Dr. Who (classic and new series)
3. My favorite authors, in order, are C.S. Lewis, Jane Austen, J.R.R. Tolkien, and Stephen Lawhead.
4. I saw the first theater release of E.T. 17 times (I was in 10th grade), and I cried every time.
5. I have read Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice no less than 30 times, and I need to buy a new copy because the other one is falling apart
6. I love math, especially higher math like Trigonometry and Calculus.

I tag whoever would like to participate.  :)

Ooops, I haven't updated in a week, and I haven't added any new resources for a longer period of time.  I've been a bit preoccupied with other trivial things, like work, projects for work I do at home, homeschooling (especially Algebra I), and celebrating my birthday that was last week.

Today I am at home during the day because I'm sick . . . again.  I'm running a fever, coughing, sneezing, and, well, all the things that go along with a nasty cold.  Hopefully I will get over it pretty quickly, and perhaps it won't develop into bronchitis . . . again.

I have a tag that I need to do, so I'll probably be doing completely that soon.  I've also been contemplating what would be a great resource to feature next.  I have some ideas swimming around my head, so hopefully today I can feature something.  How many people would be interested in my Oceanography unit study?  I have quite the collection of links to resources, and I have a Homeschool Tracker lesson plan (for those of you with HST+).  The spine of it is based on The Ocean Book by Frank Sherwin, but I have added quite a bit of extra stuff I've found around the web, and other places.  You would have to have the book for the unit study to be at it's optimum, although the extra stuff could stand on its own merit.

Well, I'm off to homeschool the kids.  I wonder what I should tackle first?  Writing essays? Good manners? ABCs? Algebra? Basic Math?  Oh, homeschooling 3 children at 3 different levels is challenging, isn't it?